Tutu: Gaza blockade abomination

Archbishop Tutu describes his feelings after visiting Gaza

Nobel peace laureate Desmond Tutu has called Israel's blockade of the Gaza Strip an "abomination".

He strongly condemned what he called international "silence and complicity" on the blockade, which he compared to the actions of Burma's leaders.

Speaking at the end of a two day mission to the area, the former archbishop said the humanitarian situation there could not be justified.

Earlier, 60 Palestinians were detained in an Israeli raid on northern Gaza.

Residents in the Beit Hanoun area were summoned to a local square by Israeli troops with loudhailers before dozens were taken away, witnesses said.

'International complicity'

Mr Tutu was in Gaza on a United Nations fact-finding mission into the killing of 19 Palestinians by Israeli shellfire in November 2006.

My message to the international community is that our silence and complicity, especially on the situation in Gaza, shames us all. It is almost like the behaviour of the military junta in Burma

Desmond Tutu 

The former archbishop of Cape Town said the international community's "silence and complicity, especially on the situation in Gaza, shames us all".

Mr Tutu said conflicts were resolved through talking to enemies not friends.

He said his meeting with the deposed prime minister, Ismail Haniya, was an opportunity to tell the Hamas leader the firing of rockets into Israel was also a violation of human rights.

During his two-day visit, Mr Tutu met relatives of 19 civilians killed in the Israeli shelling of two houses in Beit Hanoun and is due to report his findings to the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva.

He condemned the incident as a "massacre".

Israel says the Beit Hanoun deaths in November 2006 were a mistake during action to target areas used by Palestinian militants.

The Israeli military confirmed its pre-dawn incursion into Gaza on Thursday and said about 60 "wanted Palestinians" were being interrogated.

Armoured military bulldozers destroyed farmland during the incursion, witnesses told AFP news agency.

Israeli forces launch frequent attacks into Gaza which they say are aimed at combating Palestinian militants who fire rockets into Israel.

Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/middle_east/7425082.stm

 

Desmond Tutu to investigate killing of Palestinians in Gaza

By Tim Butcher in Jerusalem

Last updated: 8:43 PM BST 26/05/2008

Archbishop Desmond Tutu is planning to enter Gaza to conduct a United Nations investigation into the killing of 19 Palestinian by Israeli shells.

After 18 months of being denied a visa by Israel, the Nobel Peace Prize winner is expected to cross the border at Rafah via Egypt.

The Archbishop is intending to visit the scene of the incident in which Israeli forces fired an artillery barrage into the Gazan town of Beit Hanoun early one morning in November 2006.

The first shell hit a crowded house, causing members of the Athamneh family to run out into an alley, where they were cut down by further shells. Almost all the dead were from the same family, with the youngest being an eight-month old girl.

The Israeli army carried out its own investigation but found earlier this year that the incident was an accident, and held no individual to account for the deaths. Palestinian human rights campaigners were incensed by the finding.

Mr Tutu's trip represents a major showdown between the Jewish state and the UN Human Rights Council, which commissioned his inquiry weeks after the incident - only for his applications to Israel for a visa to be repeatedly delayed.

The Israeli authorities gave no explanation for the delays but it is known Israel has problems with the human rights council because of its constant focus on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Israeli government sources have accused the council of being politicised and biased for ignoring other human rights violations such as Darfur, while repeatedly censuring Israel.

Despite this, Israel did not prevent Louise Arbour, the then-UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, from visiting the scene of the killings a few weeks after the incident.

Mr Tutu's report is to be delivered to this September's session of the human rights council.

Story from Telegraph News